Re: error scripting parted using the mkfs command

[Joel Granados]

On Mon, May 04, 2009 at 08:50:51AM -0700, Nathan Boettcher wrote:
> Actually, that doesn't help at all.

Thats a shame :(.

>If I'm going to use 1.8.8 and go through the hassle of upgrading the system 
>utilities, I need to KNOW that it has the appropriate fixes in it.

Well, I've been using parted for my partitioning needs for quite some
time and it seem to work rather well.  I _do_ understand you lack of
trust with respect to it actually working for whatever you objective is,
so what I suggest is to test the new version on another system.  If you
don't have another system, you could always use kvm, xen or vmware to
test stuff.

>Otherwise it is pointless and wastes my time.

Well, if you were to find stuff that does not work in parted 1.8.8, it
would be very helpful to the parted project as you can confirm that in
your specific setup the app just does not work.  Far from a pointless
waste of time.

>My original questions still stand.

Sure, I bet if you look hard enough you will find someone that knows
enough about parted and can answer your question for 1.8.5.

>Also, one new question, if parted doesn't create the partition tables 
>correctly, why use parted only???

Parted _does_ create the partitions correctly.  Well, the 1.8.8 version
anyway.  What parted sucks at is creating the filesystems inside the
partitions.  This should be handled by filesystem editors not partition
editors.  So when I say "only create partitions", I mean create the
partitions with parted and the filesystem with e2fsprogs or something
that is an expert at creating partitions.

>Then you still have a broken image that you couldn't mount for squat.

I strongly suggest you use some other tool as parted is known to suck at
this.

> 
> -Nathan
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Joel Granados" <address@hidden>
> To: "Nathan Boettcher" <address@hidden>
> Cc: address@hidden
> Sent: Monday, May 4, 2009 4:10:02 AM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific
> Subject: Re: error scripting parted using the mkfs command
> 
> On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 12:44:16PM -0700, Nathan Boettcher wrote:
> > I have been trying to use parted to help automate the creation of a disk 
> > image that I can then write to a card/disk/etc.  I use sfdisk to partition 
> > the image due to parted's inability to update/create the partition table 
> > (or at least I can't figure out how to do it with parted)...part of which 
> > is the disk geometry that's needed.  Then I am trying to use parted to set 
> > up an ext2 filesystem on the first partition.  Here's an abbreviated 
> > example:
> > 
> > 1) dd if=/dev/zero of=test.dd -> create an empty image that we can then 
> > partition and fill
> > 
> > 2) sfdisk ... test.dd -> creates 2 partitions, both set to ext2
> > 
> > 3) parted -s test.dd mkfs 1 ext2 -> an attempt to make an ext2 filesystem 
> > on partition 1
> > 
> > 
> > Problem is, parted throws the exception that it's going to destroy the data 
> > and aborts the operation rather than continuing due to the -s flag.  I have 
> > tried every way I can think of to throw a confirmation to parted so it will 
> > continue and create the filesystem, but it just won't do it.
> > 
> > Can someone tell me why it's failing and how I can get it to work?  I've 
> > been searching and hammering on this for 2 days already.  I am using parted 
> > 1.8.5 as it is the only one that will compile on the linux system I'm 
> > using.  If this issue is fixed in a later release, I can see about 
> > upgrading the dependencies.
> 
> I'm guessing you should update to 1.8.8, current release.  That has a
> bunch of fixes.  You should update and create the partitions with
> parted.  _only_ the partitions.  For filesystem related stuff you should
> use utilities like mkfs.ext2 and relatives.
> 
> 
> hope it helps.
> 
> > 
> > Thanks,
> > 
> > -Nathan
> > 
> > 
> > _______________________________________________
> > bug-parted mailing list
> > address@hidden
> > http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-parted
> 
> -- 
> Joel Andres Granados
> Brno, Czech Republic, Red Hat.

-- 
Joel Andres Granados
Brno, Czech Republic, Red Hat.